What is the worst biome to try and survive in?

Only stuff in the biome is a factor to this (so no "it generates near the ocean or other stuff similar to that")

Rivers and other small biomes that generate inside of others dont count

In my opinion, Ice Spikes is very difficult: no trees, just snow and massive ice towers, maybe a Igloo. Ocean biomes aren't terrible due to you being able to find potatoes and other farm items in shipwrecks but still are not great.

Jungles always kill FPS, but that may factor more into outside sources. Staying solely within the biome, I'd have to say frozen oceans. The chances of finding trees are very slim, so you're going to be stuck chasing down live fish for quite some time whilst also finding lots of icebergs.

Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack

Watch out for the crabocalypse. Some say the day will never come. But it will.

Feel free to drop by for a chat whenever.

If you'd like to talk with me about other games, here are a few I play.

Team Fortress 2

Borderlands series (Borderlands 2 is my favorite game, ever. TPS combat is a lot of fun and makes up for the lower-quality story, in my opinion)

Elder Scrolls series

Warframe (IGN is something like That_One_Flesh_Atronach)

Pokémon series (HGSS forever)

Rocket League

Fallout series

Left 4 Dead 2 (Boomer files always corrupt though)

SUPERHOT (SUPERHOT is the most innovative shooter I've played in years!)

Dead Rising series (Dead Rising 2 is one of my favorite games, and the 3rd was a lot of fun. 1st has poor survivor AI and the 4th is bad)

Desert maybe, sure you can get glass from sand and sticks from bushes, cactus green even. But can you get wood without having to resort to an abandoned mineshaft or uncrafting chests or the luck of a pick in the blacksmiths depending on the structures or trades (Template or Village). Might not be too bad but still not the best start I guess. I may have missed some things but that's what came to mind as of typing this.

An ordinary desert would have rivers running through it and if you look for long enough you should eventually find a tree.

A buffet desert world on the other hand I don't think so.

But you might not need wood, you can get beds, doors, crafting stations and jobsite blocks from villages.

As you say there are sticks, I'd find a desert temple to loot for gold to make a pickaxe to mine cobblestone to make a pickaxe capable of mining iron and then I think you're in business. Carefully dropping sand might get you down to the treasure room faster than breaking sandstone to make stairs.

@coolgogo1226648: Were you thinking of allowing trips outside the biome to collect supplies or surviving entirely in that biome?

And by "don't count" did you mean that a desert survivor would be allowed to get wood and saplings from a river or not.

Once you have saplings and a food source I don't know that it makes much difference what biome you're in.

Ice spikes sounds pretty hard to get started in if you can't get trees from outside it.

--

You CAN find tall grass in the ice spikes biome but they are EXTREMELY rare, I ran around a whole Minecraft day and found 3! No seeds. The Wiki claims that all grass is replaced by snow blocks but that doesn't seem to be quite true (though close) grass blocks aren't all that hard to find in hollows and under overhangs but very few have tall grass on them.

Igloos aren't supposed to spawn in ice spikes, and that could well be true, I haven't seen any yet anyway.

--

As for oceans, one tree survival islands are pretty ok but a buffet ocean world is likely to spawn you in the water, it could take you a few tries to make it to one of the rare islands before the drowned got you. Trees do occasionally spawn on the islands. I'd suggest a starter chest, hopefully you'd get enough wood to make a boat.

As for oceans, one tree survival islands are pretty ok but a buffet ocean world is likely to spawn you in the water, it could take you a few tries to make it to one of the rare islands before the drowned got you. Trees do occasionally spawn on the islands. I'd suggest a starter chest, hopefully you'd get enough wood to make a boat.

Islands in the middle of the ocean don't count as being part of an Ocean biome, as they're typically Forest or Plains biomes. I'd assume the OP is referring to the singular biome itself (as stated in the Debug menu, not including whatever changes occur due to bordering biomes) or buffet worlds for simplicity's sake.

Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack

Watch out for the crabocalypse. Some say the day will never come. But it will.

Feel free to drop by for a chat whenever.

If you'd like to talk with me about other games, here are a few I play.

Team Fortress 2

Borderlands series (Borderlands 2 is my favorite game, ever. TPS combat is a lot of fun and makes up for the lower-quality story, in my opinion)

Elder Scrolls series

Warframe (IGN is something like That_One_Flesh_Atronach)

Pokémon series (HGSS forever)

Rocket League

Fallout series

Left 4 Dead 2 (Boomer files always corrupt though)

SUPERHOT (SUPERHOT is the most innovative shooter I've played in years!)

Dead Rising series (Dead Rising 2 is one of my favorite games, and the 3rd was a lot of fun. 1st has poor survivor AI and the 4th is bad)

Inspired by this thread I've started survival worlds in buffet Ice Spikes and Beach.

I don't know if I'll continue with the Ice Spikes, I don't really know what to do, I think one would have to live off of zombie meat, maybe lure them into traps and let them burn in the daylight. The strays could be a problem. And then try to find a cave that connects to a mine shaft.

The Beach world turned out to be easier than I was thinking due to there being shipwrecks here and there to get wood, carrots and potatoes from.

Also emeralds, I bought a pumpkin seed from a wandering tradesman.

I saw a pillager patrol as well, luckily far from home, I'm not geared up to tackle them out in the open yet.

Islands in the middle of the ocean don't count as being part of an Ocean biome, as they're typically Forest or Plains biomes. I'd assume the OP is referring to the singular biome itself (as stated in the Debug menu, not including whatever changes occur due to bordering biomes) or buffet worlds for simplicity's sake.

This may be so in newer versions, but I'm still playing an buffet ocean world I creaed in 1.11.2 and even while standing on an island it says it either 'ocean' or 'deep ocean'.

Actually, I spawned out in the water with no island around, and swam over to a sandbank to build sone dry land, dug over 300 blocks down and across with my bare hands (man is that slow) to find a mineshaft with wood so I could start making any tools at all. Did find an island with a tree evenually, and trapped 2 'Chicken Jockey' chickens to start a farn so I'm doing fine now with carrots and potatoes from zombie drops, and seeds from chests. And of coarse FISH ha-ha-ha

Mushroom Island biomes are probably the worst to survive in if you don't bring anything from other biomes. That's mostly because it lacks trees, but you also can't get hostile mob drops, sheep, or villagers.

If you bring in your own wood, it's one of the best places to survive. No hostile mobs, and abundant mushroom soup.

I hate to be generic but, I'd have to argue that deserts are probably the worst place to live, or even to spawn into.

Sure, you can get wood from a village if it spawns, but that's going to take a long time to get a resource that is usually as early-game as something can be. Not only that, however: the lack of grass means no early-game farming. Heck, without dirt, there will be no farming in general. But as if this food shortage wasn't enough, Husks spawn to eliminate your hunger in minutes. At least in a Mushroom Island biome, you might be able to eat raw beef for a while, but you won't last long on rotten flesh.

If you are lucky enough to kill a few spiders and grab a few sticks from dead bushes, then if you find a small pond or a cave with water, you might be able to fish to survive your way out of the desert, but remember that Husks don't burn after sunrise, so you'll need to carry a lot of food with you just in case. You are also going to have to fight with your fists until you find wood, be warned.

That being said, the Desert isn't that much worse than a Mushroom Island biome, but the Mushroom Island biome still benefits from having beef readily available in large quantities. If you can get a crafting table on a Mushroom Island, that also means leather armor almost becomes worth the cost and creating a fully-powered enchanting table requires far less grinding.

Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack

My avatar is a texture from a small block game I made in Python. It's not very good and it probably won't work if you install it.

I'm very alone in my Minecraft worlds as I don't have a very good internet connection to run a server. If you're like me, you might be interested in my Posse mod suggestion.

I don't think you can find any actual wood in desert villages any more.

Pillager outposts have lots of wood but that's more something to remember for mid game than a viable starting option.

It's not that hard to avoid mobs in the desert, the visibility is great and if you don't move not that many mobs will find you, you can build a stockade out of cactus or sand, you might want to make it narrow enough that spiders can't get in. Sure, it's always better to have food than not but unless you're playing hardcore getting killed isn't all that big a deal until you start amassing belongings.

You should also mention that lightning is a problem in deserts because it doesn't rain, so if a wooden structure such as fences get set on fire there is no rain to put the fire out for you and the fence will continue to burn, which is why it's never a good idea to have wooden structures in the desert. If you do spawn in them you should move to another biome as soon as you're ready to. It's bad luck if you do spawn in one, it is something that a random seed can get you.

Lightning doesn't strike in biomes where it doesn't rain though, with the exception of the now-obsolete Console Edition:

The target block is checked again for the following conditions:
Target block can see sky.
Rain (not snow) is falling in the target block.
Thus, lightning does not naturally strike within cold biomes, or biomes where it does not rain (except in the Console Edition).

Also, a lack of dirt (for farms or trees) isn't a problem in deserts - there is enough dirt underground to cover the surface several layers deep, so you just need to find a village (food and saplings), which are fairly common (one per 512x512 block region); sticks from dead bushes can also be used to conserve wood (you only need sticks to make tools higher than wood). I'd say that oceans are worse, especially deep oceans, which are unlikely to have areas above sea level; pre-1.7 oceans also didn't have any shipwrecks or ruins, and no chicken jockeys meant no passive mobs of any kind, excluding Mushroom Islands.

I have now tested my supposition that gold ingots from a desert temple is the way to go to get tools & armor.

I spawned near a village, as TheMasterCaver suggests that doesn't take much luck.

I stole a couple of beds and crafting tables, some torches and a little food.

It didn't take long to find a temple, collect half a stack of sand, pillar down from the gallery, punch a hole in the floor and pillar down to the treasure room, raid it and pillar back up in time to craft a golden pick and iron sword and sleep away the night.

I then found a cavern open to the surface and by the end of the second day I had full iron armor, water buckets, pickaxes and a stack and a half of dirt. (And a llama and lead from a careless wandering trader.)

I did have to kill a couple of skeletons and evade a couple of creepers.

I couple of days later I still don't have a stable food supply, those desert village farms sure are small.

And the farmers seem to mostly just stand around, until you make a move towards the farm, then they quickly start harvesting.

--

Actually, food is no problem, I just didn't recognize it.

I didn't want to slaughter the villagers cows (or sheep or horses) but the villages are full of hay bales, so all I would have had to do is uncraft some hay bales and start breeding cows.

So, in conclusion, a buffet desert world is no problem, just flat and boring.

--

Now a buffet desert hills world is likely to be a whole different matter, apparently neither villages nor temples generate there! (Though the teraign is a lot more interesting, I hope they eventually allow a real buffet world generation where one can pick several biomes.)